Ad
related to: non noble von surname meaning definition dictionary free
Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
In some cases, even an existing non-noble von became noble, or vice versa, therefore the same surname sometimes would be shared by noble and non-noble individuals. Especially in the Northwest (Bremen, Hamburg, Holstein, Lower Saxony, Schleswig, Westphalia) and in German-speaking Switzerland, von is a frequent element in non-noble surnames. [1]
In German personal names, von is a preposition which approximately means 'of' or 'from' and usually denotes some sort of nobility.While von (always lower case) is part of the family name or territorial designation, not a first or middle name, if the noble is referred to by their last name, use Schiller, Clausewitz or Goethe, not von Schiller, etc.
Prominent non-noble families having used particles are von Cappelen, von der Lippe, and de Créqui dit la Roche. The preposition til (English: to , but translates as of ; comparable with German zu ) is placed behind a person's full name in order to denote his or her place of residence, for example Sigurd Jonsson til Sudreim .
von – "of", "from"; often a sign of nobility, but also just a geographical term of the name originated of a location. zu - ( German ) "at"; a sign of nobility, sometimes in the combination von und zu , meaning the noble family still owns the place of naming
The inflation of fake nobility is one of the major concerns of the Adelsrechtsausschuss, and it is up to the commission to determine whether a person should be considered noble or non-noble. For instance, the German-American businessman Frédéric Prinz von Anhalt was born as Hans Robert Lichtenberg in Germany.
Germanic given names are traditionally dithematic; that is, they are formed from two elements, by joining a prefix and a suffix.For example, King Æþelred's name was derived from æþele, meaning "noble", and ræd, meaning "counsel".
In other monarchies of Europe, Austrian noble families may use their noble titles as well as nobiliary particles such as von and zu in their names and they still retain noble status there. This may sometimes be confusing, as descendants of nobles are sometimes referred to with noble names abroad.
Frequently, the nobiliary particle von (English 'of', or, more commonly, the French particule de noblesse 'de', meaning the same thing), was represented simply by the abbreviation v. to specify that it was being used to denote a member of the nobility, and not simply as the ordinary German-language preposition von.